“Hockey stick” climate scientist’s e-mail protected from disclosure

Global warming skeptics lose bid for scientist's e-mail.

A climate scientist widely known for the "hockey stick" graph of recent temperatures has won the right to keep his e-mail private amid unsubstantiated allegations he might have rigged research data.

Virginia's top court ruled Thursday that Michael Mann's electronic communications, generated while he was a professor at the University of Virginia, are a shielded, "proprietary" [PDF] work product.

The Energy Environmental Institute, formerly the American Tradition Institute, and a local lawmaker sought the e-mail under the state's Freedom of Information Act. The institute objects to claims that global warming is caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

Mann's troubles began in 2009, when hackers stole e-mail messages from the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia in Britain.

One e-mail from the center's director noted a "trick" in one of Mann's articles that appeared in the journal Nature. Mann, now at Penn State, has maintained that the e-mail was taken out of context.

Mann has become famous for his attempts to reconstruct the climate of the past 1,000 years. The original "hockey stick" graph suggested that the past few decades have been the warmest period in more than 1,000 years. Subsequent research by Mann and others has replicated his general conclusions.

Media groups urged the Virginia Supreme Court to demand disclosure. The Reporter's Committee for Freedom of the Press said that e-mail "among professors is not entitled to a blanket treatment as proprietary" and "must be subject to public scrutiny."

David Kravets
The senior editor for Ars Technica. Founder of TYDN fake news site. Technologist. Political scientist. Humorist. Dad of two boys. Been doing journalism for so long I remember manual typewriters with real paper. Emaildavid.kravets@arstechnica.com//Twitter@dmkravets

Actually, the idea that in antiquity everyone thought the earth was flat is also a myth largely propagated in the nineteenth century (along with superstitions about the number 13). Many societies were aware the earth is a sphere due to observations of the earth's shadow on the moon and the way ships disappear from sight. There are surprisingly accurate measurements of the earth's diameter from the Greeks, for example.

Sea level will be much higher in the future and Florida will be underwater. This will happen with or without humans. What humans are doing is moving the future forward. Even if estimates put us halfway between ice ages, there is still more natural heating that will occur. In the northern hemisphere, the longest day is June 21, but the real hot days occur in late July, early August.

When the pyramids were built they were in a lush valley. It is now desert. Bad for Egypt, good for northern Europeans. If we the tech to make it cooler, what average temperature would we go back to???? 1900, 4000BC?? The politics of this would be really ugly.

The human population of the earth has doubled in my lifetime. The number of people using electricity has at least quadrupled. Climate change is far worse because the out of control population explosion.

My skepticism is about the warming being 99% human caused. I don't think this leaves any room for the natural warming. I could live with 90%.

I believe Mann said he would "release the raw data over his dead body". That statement left me with some doubts.

Generally speaking, you aren't wrong in your points, but you may have a wrong impression of the scientific claims. The IPCC report doesn't say that there are no natural drivers of warming, just that humans the predominant driver. So you are skeptical about a claim that isn't being made AFAIK.

As far as control of climate goes, I think the most ethical approach is to exactly negate human causes, and/or dampen any possible natural sharp changes to a pace that human civilization can adapt to without trouble.

If you were under siege by people determined to find any and all faults with your work, regardless of whether there is any merit to those perceived faults, wouldn't you be reluctant to cooperate too?

What is your point about that? December 21st is the shortest day, but the coldest days are generally in January and February. Its because it takes time for the lack or overabundance of solar radiation to drive the temperature up or down. Ground soaks up heat or releases it, lakes, rivers, oceans, etc. It moderates the temperature. As does the atmosphere to some degree.

If the globabl warming we seem to be driving happened over 10 or 100x the time span that it seems to be, I'd be okay with that. I'd feel a little sad, but we'd deal as a species. It isn't even simply thinking "well, it'll be my great grand kids 40 times removed who'll have to deal with that stuff". However, the kind of changes we are talking about are occuring over the span of decades to a couple of centuries for very signiificant temperature changes and its only accelerating because of more and more pollution, deforestation, etc.

A meter sea level rise over a thousand years is easy to accomodate. A meter sea level rise in a century is just a we bit harder. Combine that with all of the "occasional" extremes that just get more extreme and you have yourself a big problem. The average hurricane might only get a little stronger, but the outliers get to be true monsters. The average rainfall in Texas might only go down a little, but the occasional extreme droughts will be true dozzies. Etc, etc.

Actually, the idea that in antiquity everyone thought the earth was flat is also a myth largely propagated in the nineteenth century (along with superstitions about the number 13). Many societies were aware the earth is a sphere due to observations of the earth's shadow on the moon and the way ships disappear from sight. There are surprisingly accurate measurements of the earth's diameter from the Greeks, for example.

The point is that "flat" would be the default assumption, concluding anything else would require work. Some people were able to do that work.